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Radiology Coding Alert

Part II:

Add ICD-9, HCPCS, Combo Lung Scan to Your Nuclear Toolbox

Published on Sat Jun 13, 2009

Discover whats missing from 78584 and 78585, and fill in the blank correctly. Nuclear medicine documentation is notorious for using terms you wont find neatly matching CPT descriptors. But help is at hand. Last month, Solve Your Lung Scan Coding Woes With Real-World Term Tips covered terms you may see for perfusion (78580), aerosol ventilation (78586, 78587),and gaseous ventilation (78591-78594). Now you can apply those skills to identifying the proper code when the physician performs a combined perfusion and ventilation exam, as well as identifying the most likely ICD-9 and HCPCS codes for these services. Avoid This Common Combo-Study Pitfall Nuclear radiologists may perform both perfusion and ventilation studies at the same encounter. In this case, you should not report a perfusion code and a separate ventilation code. Instead, you should choose from three combination codes: " 78584 -- Pulmonary perfusion imaging, particulate,with ventilation; single breath " 78585 -- & rebreathing and [...]
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